Dry Rock and long-term bacterial bloom

Jaws · #1 01-19-2015, 07:30 PM

Going through the same thing with my new 400G tank. Cloudy white and all the fish are suffering with pretty bad signs of what appears to be either ich or stress. Shouldn't be ich considering they were all in quarantine and treated with chloroquine phosphate for 3 months prior. Thanks for the tip about the UV. Hopefully that starts bringing them around. I also have about 50 pounds of live rock in a dark tank that I was hoping would help counter balance all the previous dry rock. All my dry rock was acid bathed before though so not sure why it's making the water cloudy after cycling for over two months.

TimT · #2 01-19-2015, 07:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jon.smolders

I did not do an acid bath before putting them in the tank, so all the organics in the rock could be feeding the bacteria...

The rock is pressure washed with saltwater on the dock after it is harvested. This gets rid of the majority of the external organics. There would most likely be some worms, crustaceans and bivalves within the rock that would need to cure out.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jaws

fish are suffering with pretty bad signs of what appears to be either ich or stress

I would suspect stress from low dissolved oxygen and a low redox.

Are either of you doing any home renos with gyproc/drywall at all?

albert_dao · #3 01-19-2015, 11:47 PM

Just borrow or find a used UV. It really is the best solution here.

Jaws · #4 01-19-2015, 11:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by albert_dao

Just borrow or find a used UV. It really is the best solution here.

I have a large UV too so hopefully I can get that up and running asap.

Jaws · #5 01-19-2015, 11:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TimT

Are either of you doing any home renos with gyproc/drywall at all?

Not me. I'd be surprised if there wasn't enough oxygen though. My tank has a coast to coast overflow plus 3 Maxspect Gyres, 2 MP40 Vortechs and 4 Tunze 6105s so there's plenty of surface agitation too. Or does that not matter in this case?

gobytron · #6 01-19-2015, 11:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TimT

The rock is pressure washed with saltwater on the dock after it is harvested. This gets rid of the majority of the external organics. There would most likely be some worms, crustaceans and bivalves within the rock that would need to cure out.

I would suspect stress from low dissolved oxygen and a low redox.

Are either of you doing any home renos with gyproc/drywall at all?

I would definitely be exploring other explanations other than bacterial bloom.